Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the India AI Impact Summit 2026 on February 19 at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi, launching a five-day event expected to draw more than 250,000 visitors and featuring opening ceremony addresses from French President Emmanuel Macron, United Nations Secretary-General, and top executives from OpenAI, Anthropic, Google DeepMind, Nvidia, and Microsoft as India positions itself as a major AI powerhouse and governance leader.
The summit marks the first major international AI conference hosted in the Global South and arrives as India announces more than $100 billion in combined public and private AI infrastructure investments including Adani Group's $100 billion data center commitment, Blackstone's $1.2 billion funding for Neysa AI cloud, and Yotta Data Services' $2 billion AI hub construction with 20,000+ Nvidia GPUs.
Theme Centers on Inclusive AI Development
The summit's Sanskrit theme "सर्वजन हिताय, सर्वजन सुखाय" translates to "welfare for all, happiness of all," emphasizing India's vision for AI that advances humanity, fosters inclusive growth, and safeguards the planet. Seven working groups anchor the summit aligned to three pillars of People, Planet, and Progress, covering AI for Economic Growth and Social Good, Democratizing AI Resources, Inclusion for Social Empowerment, Safe and Trusted AI, Human Capital, Science, and Resilience, Innovation and Efficiency.
Prime Minister Modi welcomed world leaders on February 18 evening at Bharat Mandapam prior to the official opening ceremony, conducting bilateral meetings with several heads of state attending the summit. The February 19 opening ceremony featured addresses from Modi, French President Macron, UN Secretary-General, and industry leaders before a tour of the India AI Impact Expo showcasing country pavilions demonstrating AI applications and innovations.
Global Tech Leadership Attendance
More than 500 global AI leaders are attending including CEOs and founders from leading AI companies. Confirmed attendees include OpenAI CEO Sam Altman who revealed India has 100 million weekly ChatGPT users making it the second-largest market globally, Anthropic CEO Dario Amodei who announced the company's first India office in Bengaluru plus an Infosys partnership, Alphabet CEO Sundar Pichai who announced Google I/O 2026 dates during his visit, Google DeepMind CEO Demis Hassabis who discussed AI model limitations in continual learning, and executives from Nvidia, Microsoft, and Cloudflare.
Indian business leaders including Mukesh Ambani and Nandan Nilekani are participating alongside the global technology executives, demonstrating collaboration between India's industrial establishment and international AI companies seeking to expand operations in the country.
The attendee composition reflects India's dual strategy of attracting foreign AI investment and technology partnerships while developing indigenous capabilities and maintaining data sovereignty through domestic infrastructure and regulatory frameworks.
IndiaAI Mission and Sovereign Compute Strategy
The summit showcases India's IndiaAI Mission designed to expand compute capacity, support startups, accelerate multilingual AI development in healthcare, agriculture, and public services, and establish India as a global AI hub. Former NITI Aayog CEO Amitabh Kant has urged development of indigenous AI systems rather than relying exclusively on foreign technology platforms.
India currently has fewer than 60,000 GPUs deployed across all providers but aims to scale to more than 2 million GPUs in coming years according to Blackstone estimates, addressing critical compute shortage that has limited India's AI development compared to the United States and China. The government targets attracting more than $200 billion in AI infrastructure investment by 2028.
Data sovereignty and indigenous capability development feature prominently in India's AI strategy as the country seeks to avoid dependence on foreign cloud infrastructure and AI platforms while ensuring data generated by Indian citizens and businesses remains subject to domestic regulatory control.
Industry Disruption Concerns Surface
The summit's optimistic tone about AI opportunity contrasts with sobering assessments from industry leaders about workforce disruption. HCL CEO Vineet Nayyar stated IT companies will focus on profits rather than job creation as AI automates programming and support functions, while venture capitalist Vinod Khosla predicted IT services and business process outsourcing sectors could "almost completely disappear" within five years due to AI capabilities.
India's $280 billion IT services industry employing millions of workers faces existential questions about how AI transforms or replaces traditional offshore development and support services that have driven India's technology sector growth for three decades. Indian IT stocks declined earlier in February following Anthropic's announcement of enterprise AI tools before recovering on news of partnerships with Indian companies.
Regional Competition for AI Leadership
The summit positions India in regional competition with China and Middle Eastern countries for AI infrastructure and governance influence. While Saudi Arabia and UAE deploy sovereign wealth fund capital into AI investments and partnerships, India leverages democratic governance, English language capability, technical talent pool, and massive domestic market as competitive advantages for attracting AI investment.
India historically remained on the periphery of AI development due to limited semiconductor manufacturing and compute infrastructure, but data centers and AI services represent India's best opportunity for global relevance in the technology race defining the next decade of economic competition.
